The Man Who Was a Doctor
by we-reidentical
Summary: Fred and George Weasley encounter a man with a funny name, a strange wand, and a bigger-on-the-inside house.


**AN:** This is the first story in a series. It isn't neccescary to read this one, but it might get confusing for later stories if you don't. I've been talking about finishing this and posting it for ages - and now finally, I'm ready to do so. So, I hope you enjoy the bit that will start it all because I really enjoyed writing it. Reviews will get you more, faster. And my eternal love.

* * *

><p>'Isn't it a bit late to be out and about? Especially two youngsters like you?'<p>

The voice startled both Fred and George into spinning around, hands behind their backs (although they carried nothing incriminating) and a matching look of guilt on their faces. Their eyes began to wander up and up and up until they found a face to pin the voice to. The man was tall and dressed funny; muggle-like. He wore a "suit" and a long over-coat. George thought, _he must be a muggle_. Fred thought, _what a weirdo_. Together, they said nothing and instead inched closer to each other – until their shoulders touched and their hands were completely hidden behind their backs. George grabbed Fred's hand in his and squeezed.

'No.' They said together. The man's eyebrows cocked up.

'Really? Well, do you know the time?' asked the man, one brow lowering whilst the other remained in its perfect arch. Fred glanced at George, who met his gaze. They didn't have a clock that told time. However, if they _were_ to look at the clock they did have, it would say _Home_. Or it should. They had tried not to wander too far away from the Burrow to make their spoons register at something danger-worthy.

They were safe here.

'Who are you?' asked Fred cautiously. His little ginger brows sunk into a frown.

'I'm The Doctor!' replied the man brightly, and his teeth sparkled in the night and stars. George blinked in tandem with his twin. _Funny name_, they thought together, unknowingly. 'And you are?' As he spoke, he flapped the tails of his overcoat away, tugged on the legs of his slacks, and crouched at the knees to be at eye-level with them.

'I'm Fred,' said George.

'I'm George,' said Fred.

'Your name is sorta funny, Mr. 'The Doctor'.' Fingers were raised and crooked down, twice, and quickly.

'Yeah. Why would your mum name you The –'

'With a last name like _Doctor_?'

'You're strange.' They said together.

The man beamed at them, head turning from left to right again and again as they each spoke in turn. He was absolutely fascinated, and there was a gleam in his eye that reminded both Fred and George of each other.

'That's brilliant,' breathed The Doctor. His smile grew until his cheeks looked fit to burst and it was more-so grinning. '_Twins_. Human twins. You know – I met twins once. Very, very peculiar twins. Except they could talk to each other telepathically. Oh, do you know that word? Hm. Weeell, it means they could speak through their minds. A little bit of a science lesson for you right there. Anyway! Yes, _twins_. A very _groovy_ happening, that is. It's amazing what the human bodies can do. Hold two little things all at once. I heard something about octuplets – oh, wait, not your time, ignore me. Are you…' He squinted, then gasped. His eyes were wide with jealousy and his mouth was big. It reminded them of the hole in the garden they always seemed to get Percy to run over, thus getting his foot stuck in it. 'You're _ginger_! Not fair. I've been waiting years and years to be ginger. And I mean _yeeeeeee-ars!_ And has it happened? I think not. I'm beginning to think I'm just going to have to cheat and do it the human way but that's no fun – actually, it takes the fun right out of it. Out of _waiting_. Now – did you introduce yourselves as each other?'

Although neither Fred nor George had been very at tentative to him as he rambled on, but his last sentence jerked them out of whatever daze they'd gone into. Simultaneously, they frowned. Neither wanted to admit it. Neither could believe he _caught_ them.

'How'd you know?' queried George, who had always been more pleasant when it came to things than Fred was. George didn't fuss over a bath; Fred wailed and let his temper towards the whole activity be known. He had a different streak of curiosity than his twin did. He liked the elaboration of things, where as Fred just wanted to know things on a surface level.

The Doctor shrugged and smiled.

'A magician never tells his secrets,' he announced with a wink. Fred popped his nose up into the air.

'We know magic –'

'Freddie!' cried George in alarm, because _muggles weren't allowed to know!_

'so that makes us magichines too, so you should tell us.'

'Magic?' there was a more thoughtful tone to it than a surprised tone. George and Fred began to eye him a tad more carefully. 'Do you know any tricks?'

'No,' they answered with the same dull, forlorn tone. They had only ever gotten to wave a wand around when they had nicked their fathers, or Percy's. Desolately, they shared a glance. Fred squeezed George's hand this time.

'One day, then.' Said the Doctor encouragingly, before shooting up to stand again. The twins started, and hunched closer to watch him. He looked to the sky, and so did Fred – but George looked around the Doctor instead.

'Wassat?' Awe colored his voice, and his short-for-now finger pointed sharply at a object behind the Doctor. The reflection of twinkling skies died in his eyes as he looked away – first to George, then to the cause of his question.

'Oh. That.'

'What is 'that' then?' Fred prodded vocally, stepping closer now that he saw it too.

'_That_ is the TARDIS.' Said the Doctor proudly. His chest puffed out like one of mum's roosters.

'Hang on,' mumbled Fred as he continued stepping closer, now pulling a reluctant George with him. He trotted around the big blue box, knocked on the door, and looked up the long length of it. 'I've seen this before. In London. Muggles use them for telly ponies or something. Whatever that means.' He huffed, and George let go of Fred's hand to inspect the door. It was open just slightly, and maybe – just _maybe_ – if he curled his fingers around the door and opened a little more…

He gasped and heard it echoed behind him.

Inside the small blue box was a big wide room with golden colors and funny things growing out of the floors and walls. _Tentacles_? There was a sound; a sound that soothed George and made him want to sit and listen forever. A hum that sounded like hello. Stairs led somewhere in the corner, and in the middle of the whole wide place – was a great big _thing_. A _thing_, because George didn't know what to call it. It was big. And there was stuff on it that made it a thing. With a pleasance, George realized the thing with the big tubey-thinger (again, lack of better word naming) was making that lovely hum.

'Oof,' he mumbled as Fred nudged him aside, curiosity having murdered his cat and got the better of him. He spun in circles, taking it all in, before he barrelled by George to get out. This time, George fell on his rump and twisted 'round to see where his twin was going. Fred appeared from the other side of the box, where he had not run off in the first place, and then dashed back inside. Once more, he ran out, and ran even _faster_ around the TARDIS – as if he was trying to catch it in the act of being big and long.

He did this a few times as a petulant child would, before he came to a panting halt.

'It's bigger on the inside! George – Georgie! He's a wizard! I bet you he's a wizard!' exclaimed Fred, pointing at the Doctor now who had been watching very quietly, and very amusedly. He laughed even then as Fred pointed and vibrated with excitement. 'Only magic can do that,' added Fred with finality. He regarded The Doctor with a new light in his eyes. Respect, and intrigue.

'Is this your house?' asked George, upon looking in again. It looked like someone would live in it. It looked like a proper wizards house. 'I didn't know anyone else lived close by.'

'There's the Lovegoods –'

'But they're loons, says Dad.'

Fred made a noise like a loon on a lake; his rendition was rather poor and sounded more like a cow. The effort had been evident, though.

'It's kind of like my house,' agreed The Doctor partially, his long strides taking him to the door where George was plopped in front of, and offered a hand to pull him up. George took it and quickly scrambled to flat ground before he was zinging towards Fred, taking his hand in a grasp. 'I live in it and I travel the stars,'

'The stars?' Fred pounced on that. 'Do you mean –' He pointed to the sky. The Doctor drooped his head down and then swung it back up in one big nod.

'Yep. That's what I mean. You ever look up at the sky and see a shooting star? That's me. It's big and empty but teeming with one thing: _life_. It's beautiful and bigger than me, certainly bigger than you, and – what?' Fred was looking at the Doctor with such gusto it seemed he could've popped right out of his shoes; filled to the brim with it.

'Can you take us?' he promptly asked, and he dashed up to grab the Doctor's sleeve and tug. 'Right now?' George slipped up behind his twin, nodding in time with him without having to glance. The Doctor balked.

'Not right now – maybe when you're older – speaking of, I'd say you best be off. Imagine what your mother would say if she found you in a field with a strange man with a big blue box, hmm?' The Doctor's lower lip tucked in and his brows hiked up; all a very challenging, childishly so, expression. George blinked up at him and thought, _he looks nice_. _I like this Doctor._ Fred glared up at him and thought, _imagine what mum would say if she found _you_ talking to us_.

'Go on,' encouraged the Doctor, putting a hand on either of their shoulders and pushing. George went, where as Fred stomped his feet into the damp Earth and held steady.

'No!' he barked, and spun away from the nudging. 'Not until you promise. To come back when we're older and take us to the stars." Fred's voice had a bewildered sort of tone to it with a side of impatience as he begun to yank at the man's sleeve. 'Do it.'

George, deciding to back his twin up, nodded quite vicariously beside him, and he too begun to pull on his sleeve, opposite of Fred.

The Doctor balked, but when Fred got louder and George joined in – he cracked.

'Oh, alright, alright, alright!' he said, making shushing noises and following them up with gestures, like he was trying to push the volume down. 'When you're older.'

'Promise,' said Fred and George together. 'Promise!'

'I promise!' cried the Doctor, if only to get them to stop now. He looked around to make sure no one had come along – because he had been right. It would certainly be quite odd if anyone were to come along and see a man with two children who looked nothing like him. He turned back to the beaming twins. 'But you must go back home, now.'

At the time, neither Fred nor George bothered to question how he would locate them. As far as they were concerned, this wizard was brilliant (as opposed to 'strange' – which they had thought earlier-) and he was surely going to come back to them.

'But if I'm going to find you,' said the Doctor slowly, pulling out a long and curious looking thing. Fred gasped. George cocked his head.

'That's a neat wand!' announced Fred. 'Dad doesn't even have a fancy one like that.'

'What? Wand? No! This is a – oh, you're too young,' the man waved off the matter, and flicked a switch. The thing began to whirr and it basked them in a bright, small glow as it traveled the length of them. 'There. Now I'll be able to find you.' He nodded. 'Now go!'

And without waiting to see if they had obeyed, he spun on his shoed heel and waltzed quickly back to his 'house', as the twins deemed it in their heads. He hadn't shut the door for more than a minute before right before their very eyes, the color of it begun to dim. A hum, like a bee passing their ears back and forth, came in and out. It took them both a moment to realize that it was not fading – it was disappearing! Soon, there only stood an empty field and them.

The grass stirred under the winds' manipulation and licked around their bare ankles. The moon lit up the rows of hills around them, and George looked up to where the stars twinkled brightly. The chance encounter seemed fake now. As if something so curiously wonderful had just been a dream. He squinted, and swore he saw a streak of blue cut through the burning white dots above and the inky black.

'I can't wait to grow up, Georige.' breathed Fred. George could only nodded in agreement.

In the still of a thrilling night, Fred pushed George and George flicked him in the neck. They broke into a mad dash to be the first one back home, and to a long wait-time before they would see the man again.


End file.
